To Ceasar What Belongs to Ceasar


Is God’s power opposed to political power? What is the relationship between these powers? Today’s readings shed some light on this mystery.

God’s power is superior to any human power. Cyrus’s power comes from God (cf. Isaiah 45:1, 4-6) as does every authority on earth. Nobody could obtain human power without God’s allowing it. Some people use God’s given power in the wrong way, but God does not punish all of them in this life.

God’s power is not opposed to the right use of human power. Jesus does not oppose Ceasar regarding taxes (cf. Matthew 22:15-21). Ceasar has a certain right over the material goods of his subjects. God, however, has an absolute right to our faith and love. If Ceasar ever asked us something against our faith and our love, we would not give it to him, because Ceasar is not more than God. Ceasar could send us to jail until death, but God can punish us and Ceasar after death and forever. In those cases, we must obey God rather than human beings.

Even in cases in which political power persecutes Christians, God’s power can be manifested in two ways, as St. Paul says (cf. 1 Thessalonians 1:1-5b), two ways in which God’s power is seen as superior to any human power. Firstly, the miracles God works through Christians testify that nothing in nature can oppose the power of God. Secondly, the witness of the martyrs, whose faith overcomes every bodily torment, testifies that no human power can overcome the love of God poured out into the hearts of His faithful. In other words, the miraculous healings, which still nowadays happen, testify God’s absolute power over nature; whereas the witness of martyrs, to the point of shedding their blood, testifies that God’s love can make a human being stronger than any human power of coercion.

Christians must respect human power in the legitimate exercise of its autonomy: Christians obey civil law. God’s authority is absolute, and therefore superior to human authority. God’s authority, on principle, is not opposed to human authority: God loves what he has created, including human authority. Human authority, however, may go out of boundaries and oppose God’s authority sometimes. When this happens, human power is not promoting the common good. What common good can come from opposing the Author of all good?

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